EVERY piece of jewellery made by Helen Rennison and Sue Ley - otherwise known as Heart and Soul - features a heart somewhere. Sometimes it's a massive great stone that forms the main piece of a necklace. Sometimes it's a tiny bead hiding almost unnoticed near the clasp. But somewhere, they've made their mark.

At the moment, Heart and Soul is, literally, a cottage industry. Helen and Sue work in Helen's home near Richmond, a table piled high with beads, necklaces and bracelets glinting in the snowy, spring sunshine shining through the window.

Both young mothers, they did a silversmithing course in Harrogate together and followed that up with a course in beading from one of the country's leading beaders in London.

"It wasn't just learning techniques, it opened our eyes to the amazing possibilities of beads that are available," says "Up here you're lucky if you can find one or two shelves full - down in London we were looking at entire rooms and floors of beads. It was heaven," says Helen.

They started making jewellery and selling it, tentatively at first, at parties in friends' houses. "And we couldn't believe the response," says Sue. "Pieces just sold immediately."

Their styles range from very girly pieces in pink, through dramatic necklaces in jet and amber, plus lots of very classy designs _ some with an antique look, others bang up-to-date, interesting and unusual.

"We're always experimenting, trying new things," says Sue.

They use amber, gold, rose quartz, jasper, jade, tiger-eye amazonite and many more - the names almost as pretty as the stones, and fastened with silver hand made catches, every one interesting and just a little different. No two pieces are the same.

Ultimately, they want to source their own stones, travelling to Arizona and Eastern Europe. "Every time we see something new, it gives us new ideas, new possibilities," says Sue.

They undertake commissions and are already getting a name for wedding jewellery, often using rose quartz and lots of crystal. "Weddings have become so important, so individual now and brides have asked us to do something just for them," says Helen.

And, of course, their heart is always in the right place.

l Heart and Soul Jewellery will be in shops soon. Necklaces sell from around £60, bracelets from around £30. (01325) 718336.